A coalition of farmers and environmental groups have filed a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Agriculture after the agency removed crucial information from its website. They believe its restoration will help farmers and researchers protect against agricultural collapse.
According to the filing, the USDA scrubbed resources used to inform agricultural planning, including data sets, interactive tools, and information about how to access financial assistance.
The suit states it did this without advance notice, as required under the 1995 Paperwork Reduction Act — focused on protecting timely and equitable access to information collected by or for the federal government to "ensure the greatest possible public benefit."
According to the USDA, "The Paperwork Reduction Act is a law and must be complied with regardless of the origin or reason for the collection." The suit also alleges the USDA failed to comply with the Freedom of Information Act and the Administrative Procedure Act.
"By failing to provide any justification for doing so, USDA took agency action that was arbitrary, capricious, an abuse of discretion, or not in accordance with law, in contravention of the APA," the suit reads.
The Jan. 30 information purge coincided with a funding freeze, "pulling the rug out from underneath grant recipients who have invested significant time, money, and effort implementing practices that help them mitigate and manage the effects of climate change," per the filing.
The agriculture industry is critical to ensuring food security. However, most farmers polled in Bayer's latest Farmer Voice survey report that extreme weather events — supercharged by a warming planet — are leading to significant revenue loss. Three-quarters of respondents say they worry about how rising global temperatures are impacting their farms.
Peter Lehner, a lawyer for Earthjustice — one of the suit's plaintiffs — spoke to these real-world challenges in a statement to the New York Times, saying: "You can purge a website of the words 'climate change,' but that doesn't mean climate change goes away."
Other plaintiffs of the suit, filed Feb. 24, include the Natural Resources Defense Council, the Environmental Working Group, and the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University — on behalf of the Northeast Farming Association of New York, per the Times.
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Definitely 👍 "Right now, because of climate change and because of what farmers are facing in terms of extreme weather events, we need every piece of available information we can get. We don't have access to that; we're not going to make it," said Wes Gillingham, who now raises livestock after a series of floods decimated his vegetable-growing operations.
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The suit is requesting for the pages to be restored and for the USDA to follow established regulations before removing or "substantially modifying" climate-related information.
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